1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to a knee airbag device that includes a knee airbag that is inflated and deployed to restrain knees of an occupant when a collision occurs.
2. Description of the Related Art
Various knee airbag devices have been proposed to protect the knees of an occupant. For example, each of Japanese Patent No. 2759065 and Japanese Patent Application Publication No. 9-104317 (JP-A-9-104317) describes a knee airbag device in which an airbag module is disposed inside a column lower cover that covers the rear end portion of a steering column.
However, in the above-described technology, when the knee airbag is inflated and deployed, the knee airbag may contact a key accessory (a key chain or the like) and a manual tilt lever provided on the side of the column cover. Accordingly, the above-described knee airbag device needs to be improved in this regard.
Reinforcement cloth or the like may be provided in the portion of the knee airbag, which may interfere with the key accessory or the like, to reinforce the portion of the knee airbag. In this case, however, the number of components, and the number of man-hour required to assemble the knee airbag device are increased, and accordingly, the cost is increased.